Gribblenation

One of the crookedest streets in the United States of America is in a place that you may not expect. In Burlington, Iowa, a small city located on the banks of the Mississippi River, lies Snake Alley. This is a twisty, curvy street that descends (or ascends) a hill between the residential and commercial parts of the city, named for a snake due to the way the street meanders around the hill. The business district of Burlington is built in a natural amphitheater surrounded by hills. With all the commerce situated in the valley, transportation was extremely difficult for the residents living on the steep hills surrounding the downtown. Therefore, the citizens of Burlington citizens decided to try an experiment for travel between the residential and commercial areas of town. In 1894, Snake Alley was constructed with an experimental street design, filled with switchbacks. It was planned and implemented by three local residents who were also engineers and paving contractors, Charles Star...

Within in the City of Fresno eastward towards Minkler the current route of California State Route 180 has been progressively updated to the Sequoia-Kings Canyon Freeway and Kings Canyon Expressway over last couple decades.  Given I live within only a couple blocks of CA 180 the freeway/expressway portion I decided to finally get around to checking out of the entirety of the completed limited access grade.  While this might not be as exciting a two-lane section of roadway descending Kings Canyon or fables of a Trans-Sierra Highway that never existed on anything but paper I figured that it would be a fitting end to the CA 180 series. The current CA 180 alignment on the Sequoia-Kings Canyon Expressway spans from Brawley Avenue eastward to De Wolf Avenue.  From De Wolf Avenue the Kings Canyon Road expressway alignment of CA 180 continues eastward to Centerville.  Presently a new segment of expressway is being built to bypass Centerville and Minkler. My previous tw...